TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) says Chinese leader Xi Jinping (習近平) wants the military to be ready to invade Taiwan in 2027, though he will not necessarily order the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to do so, reports said Saturday (Sept. 17).

CNN intelligence and national security correspondent Katie Bo Lillis tweeted that CIA Deputy Director David Cohen had told her Xi wants “to have the capability to take control of Taiwan by force by 2027.” However, he added that the United States intelligence community did not believe Xi had already reached a decision about when to launch an invasion.

Xi “has asked his military to put him in a position where, if that’s what he wanted to do, he would be able to,” Lillis quoted Cohen as saying. The CIA official said the Chinese leader still preferred to “get control through nonmilitary means,” the CNN correspondent tweeted.

American Military News reported that U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley last year attributed the date of 2027 to a speech by Xi. The Communist leader told the PLA to ramp up its modernization in order to be able to seize Taiwan in 2027 instead of in 2035, Milley told Congress.

The top U.S. general also emphasized that Xi wants the capability, but has not reached a decision to launch an attack.